In your table, including when during the employee’s employment, each specific activity should occur, who is responsible for conducting that activity, and why you chose that activity as a part of your process. Your table should be prepared in a format that can be used as both a description of t

Week 3 – Assignment: Design an Onboarding Timeline
Starting on Day 1 and running all the way through Day 180, create a timeline of activities to be directed at and completed with new employees. Use the table in Section 2 as a guide and customize the table for your own organization.

In your table, including when during the employee’s employment, each specific activity should occur, who is responsible for conducting that activity, and why you chose that activity as a part of your process. Your table should be prepared in a format that can be used as both a description of the process as well as a checklist that an HR staffer can use to track the progress of an employee’s onboarding.

Your onboarding timeline must include steps that ensure:

• The employees understand the policies and procedures of the organization.
• They understand their job duties.
• They understand what’s expected of them in terms of job performance.
• They understand their compensation and benefits.
• They are familiar with their workspace and other surroundings.
• There is an opportunity for them to ask questions without feeling uninformed or judged.
• There is an ongoing feedback process in place so the employees will receive objective feedback in relation to their performance.
• Supervisors and managers have a formal method to check for dissatisfaction or the possibility that the employees are considering leaving the organization.
• Other issues are addressed that help ensure the employees feel welcome and that their needs are being met.
Length: 3 pages, not including title and reference pages

References: Include a minimum of 3 scholarly resources

Section 2: Talent Development
Once the applicants have been recruited, interviewed, and hired, ensuring their fit by effectively communicating your organization’s policies, procedures, and work rules, along with proactively helping them feel welcome, are key aspects of the staffing strategy.
Once the new employees are hired, effective onboarding is crucial. Onboarding is about integrating employees into your healthcare organization’s culture in such a way that they prosper and grow personally and professionally with your organization. This leads to increased employee engagement, which fosters better patient care and increases employee retention (Maurer, 2018).
According to research by the Partnership for Public Service and Boston Consulting Group (Temin, 2019), facilities with better employee engagement delivered better patient services; a one-point increase in the employee engagement scale correlated with a half-point increase in patient satisfaction scores for the overall medical center. Better employee engagement scores resulted in a quarter-point increase in satisfaction with specialty or primary care providers.
The onboarding process should last for at least the employee’s first year of employment and should include but not be limited to:
When What
Day 1 • General job orientation, tour, and introductions
• Work schedule and work hours
• Professional ethics and code of conduct
• All policies, such as safety and security policies
• Compensation and benefits
• Employee handbook
• Position information
• Setting up workspace
Week 1 • Initial assignments
• Personal interaction to see if they’re becoming comfortable
• Performance evaluation description and goal setting
• Review the probationary-period rules
• Key colleagues have been introduced
Month 1 • Solicit feedback
• Review work-to-date
• Ensure payroll information is correct
• Personal interaction to see if comfortable
Month 4 • 90-day performance review
• Goal review and revision as needed
• Identify training needs
• Personal interaction to see if comfortable
Month 7 • Goal review and revision as needed
• Employee has received all necessary training
• Personal interaction to see if comfortable
Month 13 • Yearly performance review
• Recognize first-year anniversary
• Feedback
• Personal interaction to see if comfortable
• Appropriate salary increase
Table 1. Onboarding Timeline
To accompany and support onboarding, the healthcare organization needs to have an operational performance management system whereby employee performance can be objectively and fairly evaluated regardless of the job duties assigned.
In addition to measuring performance, fair and legal processes must be in place to hold staff accountable to the expectations of their roles within the organization. Such a process may include:
1. Ensure performance expectations are clear and understood by the employee—this has to begin on the first day during onboarding, where the employee is told and asked to acknowledge understanding of expected performance. Gaps in understanding must be addressed at that time, and employment cannot continue until the employee expresses understanding of what’s expected.
2. Address the poor performance as soon as possible through both effective verbal communication and thorough written documentation—delays in addressing poor performance create additional challenges and make the poor/unacceptable performance more difficult to address later. Once poor performance is observed and allowed to continue, it changes from unacceptable performance to acceptable performance. Not only must you ensure understanding by the employee of the performance expectations, you must document the conversation for future reference.
3. Address only the gap between expectations and observed performance—it is important to stick to job-related performance issues and corrections. Personal issues, unless covered by employment laws (such as the Americans with Disabilities Act), should be avoided.
4. Through the use of clear and concise written action plans, be clear on what happens next (actions expected and consequences)—the employee must understand at the conclusion of the meeting what the consequences of both compliance and non-compliance to expectations will be. Communication must be clear and direct.
5. Follow through and follow up—set a timeline for follow up and stick to it, even if it’s unpleasant.
References:
Direct link found between employee engagement, quality at VA hospitals. (2019, March 27).
Maurer, R. (2018, April 11). Onboarding key to retaining, engaging talent.
Onboarding and Retention
Creating written onboarding processes that formally welcome employees to the organization—as well as checking in with them during their first 90 days—helps new employees feel like they belong as well as give them a chance to ask questions in a non-threatening format. These processes usually are designed as a calendar/checklist that documents not only what onboarding action should take place but also when it should take place and who is accountable to ensure it happens. Staff who feel welcomed and are given opportunities will feel more connected to the organization and, therefore, be less likely to leave.
The Society for Human Resources Management (SHRM) states that the vast majority of new hires’ decisions to stay with a company long-term is made within the first six months of employment (Maurer, 2018).
On an ongoing basis, healthcare leaders must subjectively and objectively measure the engagement levels of all staff and determine what changes can and should be made in order to create an environment where the employees want to stay and are productive while employed.
Several methods exist to effectively measure the staff’s level of engagement in a healthcare organization. First and foremost, first-level management (supervisors) should be continuously interacting with their staff, which allows them to read signals from staff that indicate if the employee is feeling satisfied or dissatisfied with the work environment, the assigned job duties, or any other work-related factors that may impact the worker’s decision to stay or resign. Addressing dissatisfaction at this level and when it’s first noticed keeps it from growing into non-productivity or turnover.
Upper-level management can also interact with staff or make rounds on a regular basis. When this is done as a part of a formal retention strategy, it allows for senior management to also get a feel for the level of engagement within the healthcare organization. Finally, using formal surveys or other methods to objectively measure employee engagement can help in identifying and addressing issues that can lead to employee dissatisfaction. Sometimes, there are issues that upset employees, but they are unwilling to discuss this directly with management; so the anonymity of a survey allows them to raise the subject in a safer way.
Be sure to review this week’s resources carefully. You are expected to apply the information from these resources when you prepare your assignments.
References:
Maurer, R. (2018, April 11). Onboarding key to retaining, engaging talent.

• Human resources in healthcare: Managing for success (4th ed.).
Fried, B., & Fottler, M. D. (2015). Human resources in healthcare: Managing for success (4th ed.). Health Administration Press.
Read Chapters 7 and 8
• Healthcare’s challenging relationship between onboarding and employee retention
Macon, M. (2017, Oct. 3). Healthcare’s challenging relationship between onboarding and employee retention [Web log post].
• How to measure and improve employee engagement
Nolinske, T. (n.d.). How to measure and improve employee engagement [White paper].
• Adopting a Systematic Approach to Bringing Healthcare Executives Into a New Position or Organization. (n.d.).